What Gods Envy
by TheParagonPariah
Summary: Humans envy power. Mortals envy an eternal legacy. But when one achieves both, what does he become? He becomes a god among men, one who's name will be etched into history. However, even a god can feel envious. One-shot, SoSP perspective.


**A/N: Hey guys! I know I haven't uploaded anything for The Hyuuga's Black Eye in some time, and that's because I'm currently rewriting it! In my spare time, though, I was able to create this little tidbit! Keep in mind that the style of writing you see here will essentially be how I reconstruct HBE in the future! Also, since my good friend was practically grovelling at my feet earlier(not really), I guess I'll do as he requested: please check out his story, The Winds of Change. It's written by the one and only ZeroJackson, and if you like what you see here, you'll love what you find in that story. BUT ENOUGH SELFLESS PLUGS! I hope you enjoy this one-shot! :)**

Unhallowed winds whisk throughout my place of sanctuary, their subtle whistling and howling helping to ensure me of my solitude as I sit upon the throne mankind has made me. This entire cathedral, mankind has constructed in my honor, all in hope that I would subcome to all things a human may, and will, desire. They come to me in want, yet rarely in need. They place me upon a pedestal, sing songs in my honor as their soldiers and brutes alike ravage distant lands which they cannot claim as their own. They often come upon the resignation of the golden sun, groveling on their knees like a child begging their parent for something unnecessary, pleading my aid amongst their men in the field of battle. They demand for the revival of soldiers, loved ones, clansmen and leaders. They come and demand to be taught my craft, some going as far as to set up a temporary settlement beside my place of residence in hopes that I will give in to their whims.

Am I capable of doing such things? Yes, I am quite capable; in fact, I am capable of most, if not all things. However, these people, all of humanity, seem to forget that I am not a god, but a mere man.

Even I yearn for a title of more humanity, now having been downgraded to that of a magic lamp, one that all come to rub and wear out their three precious wishes on.

Large, imposing stone pillars align the corridor leading to my throne, their overwhelming stature only rivaled by the sheer size of the room which they reside within. If a pin were to hit the floor, one could hear the nearly nonexistent echo from the opposite end of the room, possibly for hours if they were to listen long enough. Torches align these pillars, unlit as the dying embers from hours past allow their dim orange light to fade out. Because of the lack of light, the walls to my left and right which stretch far from me are hidden in a black cowl of darkness, giving off an uncomfortable sensation to all except me. I prefer this corridor to be dark, particularly when I slump into of the jewel-cascaded seat with my legs sprawled about and an elbow on the armrest, my head resting upon the rough bone of my worn-out knuckles. The moon's omniscient light filters through dark blue stained glass positioned behind and casts a foreboding shadow of myself down the cold, marble floor upon which many come to grovel. I hear myself sighing heavily with each breath as my line of sight travels down the dark blue carpet in front of my throne all the way towards the colossal doors opposite of the room from me, awaiting tonight's beggars and village heads. Each breath refuels my psyche, the scentless chilled air within the confines of this room reminding me that I still do have some form of a soul residing underneath my chakra-coated flesh.

I can feel a presence approaching, and I feel my eyelids dip downwards until I see nothing but blackness. The oncoming individual is frantic, his chakra being a maelstrom of anticipation, worry, regret.

And fear. The fear of inevitable.

I focus on the individual's chakra, and can tell who it is as the distance between us shortens. At 1000 meters, I can tell it is a male, short, relatively stocky. Fire-natured chakra, inquiring a brash and rugged personality; this man is the type to act upon instinct, not thought. They are carrying a weapon of some sort, perhaps a standard katana, and their grip on it's handle is akin to that of a snake's body around a helpless prey. I feel a heavier presence behind him, and I open my eyes as I allow my concentration to falter as I begin to stroke my lengthy chin-beard. I know what is coming, what they want of me and my specialties, for they have asked politely before. I refused to comply on multiple occasions, and this will undoubtable be the last time I will have to discuss these numerous topics with anyone.

Well...anyone in this nearby village, anyway…

I sense a different, yet quite familiar presence approaching the doors rapidly, and remain motionless as I wait, as usual. A woman bursts through the door with an air of panic about her, the gargantuan mahogany doors colliding against the stone walls they rest on with a mighty thud which bounced around the room. Her chakra is dancing about frantically, and her beautiful young face was contorted in a manner which I hated, one which I never wish to see her wear. "My love, they are coming! They are infuriated, and have weapons, and-", she begins to ramble on, yet the raise of my hand in a calming motion pauses her words.

"I know, love," is all I have to say as my hand falls back down onto my lap, the rest of my body remaining solidified in it's slackened position.

Although the room is darkened, I can see a veil of tears forming over her beautiful lavender eyes more clear than daylight. She has trouble speaking, a faint studder tainting her words. "B-but, Hagoromo...they wish for your blood," she murmured before eyes were downcast, a small tear now riding down her pale cheek.

Her words were like a knife to my heart, the tear she shed confirming her honesty. These ungrateful citizens, for whom I have sacrificed so much for, would raise the sword against me in rebellion? Have they no dignity?! I felt my jaw set as my brow scrunched downwards with anger, and stood from my throne. The sound of the metallic plated armor rustling beneath my tattered haori quickly gained the attention of my wife, and she looked to me with longful eyes, her unspoken concerns for my safety, and not her own, bringing me solace as I am reminded of my humanity.

No god is truly loved, only a human is capable of receiving such a wondrous sensation.

My footsteps are heavy, only muffled by the lengthy carpeted path I walk along as I came closer to her. She looked lovely in the moonlight, her dark red kimono draping over her slender body and her dark-blue, wavy hair falling past her face and blanketing her shoulders. I hold out my arms, and she promptly complied by rushing in close, allowing me to embrace her. She felt warm, yet shivered as if she were buried in snow. She buries her face into the armor covering my chest, now letting tears flow like waterfalls as she unleashes all her emotions. "Why!? Why must they hate you?! Why must everyone hate you!? All you wish for is the well-being of everyone, and yet they are never satisfied! Why!?"

I have no answer for her that sounded humane, for the truth itself was rather inhumane. I wished to tell her that it was merely the way humanity was; vile, greedy, self-centered, seeking nothing but personal gain. However, now was not the time for such words. I moved away from her, and grasped her soft, tender hand. I looked into her eyes for what seemed like an eternity, my soft gaze easing her tense one.

"My love, I know how you feel, but you must realize that this is an inopportune time for worry." I give a quick glance down to the slight bump in her belly, and look back up to her. "You are expecting a second child, you mustn't be here. Quickly, go to our son, and flee from this place. I will come to you after I have quelled the townsfolk."

My words held authority, yet only she was capable of hearing the concern in my cold voice. She gave a slow nod, turned around, and quickly headed out of the room and around the corner towards our child's room. I listened to her footsteps, the subtle patting of her bare feet against the hard floor growing softer as she heads deeper into our labyrinth of a home. There was a moment of silence, and then her footsteps could be heard yet again as she made her way towards a back exit, this time accompanied by the sounds of footsteps from smaller feet. The door opened and closed swiftly, and I could feel their chakra quickly gaining distance from mine. However, a slight grimace formed upon my face, for I felt a much larger quantity approaching the front of my home.

It was time.

A barrage of angered shouting was accompanied by a plethora of heavy stomps as the angered men of the nearby village flooded into my room, all of them wielding some sort of object with the intention of harming me. Ungrateful pigs, they would be quite lucky to even come close enough to graze my armor. The boisterous shouting grew louder, more furious as expletives were launched in my general direction and weapons were waved about in a more aggressive manner. I raised both my hands at once to quell the silence, yet it did little. "Please, calm yourselves! Tell me, what ailes you? What brings you all here with such hostility?!" I asked them with as oblivious of a tone as I can muster. I know the answers before they are even spoken.

"Why haven't you helped us take over other lands?!"

"Why won't you heal my father?!"

"How long until you bring my wife back to life?!"

"When will you create gold for us?!"

"I demand you train our clan!"

"Why do you sit here and do nothing!? We NEED you!"

My hands collapse to my sides in vexation. Just as I had thought. "Please, if you will allow me to explain-" is how I began to speak before a short, stocky man wielding a katana emerged from the crowd, and pointed his weapon in my direction. The same man who was leading this very crowd before, the one I sensed. His chakra flow was wild, indicating he was fearful of being so close to me with a weapon in hand. He was awaiting me to have death embrace him.

"Y-You know what? We don't wanna hear no more excuses, r-right?" he shouted at me before turning to look over his shoulder, the angry mob hollering in agreement before settling back down. He turned his attention back to me with a more steadfast expression, as if the mob had boosted his confidence. "Our women and children still get sick, us men keep dying out there on the battlefields that YOU haven't taken for us! You sit up here all high n' mighty in this giant thing that WE built for you out of the goodness of our hearts, and you don't do anything in return! Right?"

The mob agreed with a hollar.

"Yeah! And when you DO come down to us, all you do is talk about chakra! Who the hell cares about that, anyways? When will you make us crops that we don't have to replant, or turn our water into gold? When will you repay us, huh?"

I felt my calm demeanor crumble apart like a fragile stone, and i scowled, scaring the man back towards the comforting numbers of the crowd. "You...you have the GALL to accuse me of acting selfishly? How DARE you!" I bellowed out at them. I could feel fire chakra welling up within my stomach, fury coiling within my gut as I clenched my jaw and balled my fists, and my whole body began to tremble. "I have attempted to teach you my ways, and yet you refuse to accept them! You only wish to exploit me for your own gain, and nothing more! Does my knowledge mean nothing to you? The knowledge of the Sage of Six Paths?" My gravelly voice strained from growing so loud, yet I could not control myself. I felt betrayed, but they would not hear my words of anguish unless they roared out like thunder. "I asked not for this temple, I asked nothing of you! You all CHOSE to grant me with this home, to waste time, money and resources on gaining my trust! But I can see through all those manipulative words, those malicious lies, and I can see your true intentions!"

I activated my doujutsu, the glowing purple light emerging from behind the many ripples proving to be intimidating enough to put the mob on edge.

"...I must be truthful with you all, I am rather agitated by your accusations. I will give you only one chance to leave my home, after which I will leave from here, never be seen by you all again."

My frown deepened as the majority of the mob simply gripped their weapons tighter. "...however, if you are foolish enough to stay, then you will have confirmed my suspicions. Your village is to be considered one full of barbarians, and I will make swift work of erasing it's existence, along with all your women and children." The threat froze the mob, none of them sure if I was bluffing or being honest. Make no mistake, I was quite sincere. I am always sincere…

However, brutes will be brutes…

"Don't listen to him! Just get him!" one of them shouted from amidst the crowd. This one voice caused an uproar of battle cries as the men all charged me at once, the floor now rumbling to the point where one would think an earthquake was erupting from the earth below.

I felt my eyelids lower. "You fools…" I muttered under my breath. I would not have to put any real effort into this battle. I blitzed within the depths of the crowd of angered souls, delivering swift punches and kicks to my adversaries. I could hear the sounds of bones snapping, organs being pierced, gurgling as some choked on their own blood while others struggled to breath through crushed windpipes. Blood began to splatter onto the pillars and floor, giving the dark, pale blue stone a fine array of crimson splotches as I increased the chakra in my limbs. I felt more coming, I could hear a few leaving my home and shouting for assistance; the whole village would soon be at my doorstep, up in arms and yearning for my head. It means naught to me, for I was almost done here. I spun around after a breaking someone's ribcage to confront a man swinging his katana down upon me. I felt my eye twitch, and he unlucky soul was launched away by an unseen force, an almighty push. He had gone through the doors and out the entrance to my house, which resided on a hilltop, meaning that he most likely had made a fine stain upon the earth far below. I swiped my arm in front of me, grabbing the handle of his weapon in midair and readying it for combat as I calmly walked out the entrance of my home, two more men charging me foolishly. I blitzed over to one of them and sliced the blade cleanly through his neck, blood now erupting from the body as it went limp. Time seemed to slow as the warm, red liquid began to rain down upon me, and it made me feel horrible. It made me feel horrible because, deep down, I knew that I was enjoying this. I was ecstatic, finally being allowed to use my power to do as I pleased, to prove my superiority over the human race.

To prove my status as a god.

A battle cry roaring out behind me was enough to bring me back into reality; there was another man. I charged the sword full of lightning chakra and flung it over my shoulder, impaling the second brute through the chest before I slowly turned to examine him. His irises had shrunken and trembled horribly as he gripped the handle of the electrified metal weapon, though it simply scorched his palms. Static ran throughout his body before his eyes rolled up, and he collapsed to the floor as nothing more than a charred corpse. Normally, I would give a man as brave as this a moment of silence. In fact, I would have done the same for all these men. But they were fools, and they died as they lived: being foolish. The death of a fool is not something I would lose sleep over, it simply was not worth my time. I turned around and walked to the steep decline of the hill before me and looked down, seeing what had to be over 10,000 men and older children about 100 meters away charging from down below. Rather than wait for them to meet their demise up here, I instead concentrated fire chakra within my gut and inhaled deep. "Fire Style Jutsu!" I shouted before angling myself downwards, a gargantuan blaze escaping my lips and swarming over the whole side of the massive hill. Roaring, dancing embers consumed the grassy plains before me, and I stopped exhaling the dangerous technique. I waited a few moments to see if anybody had survived, but there was nothing, nobody. Just flames. Flames whisking about to reveal multiple charred bodies, half of which were crumbling into piles of ash. A sadistic grin perked a corner of my mouth upwards, as sickening as it sounds. Imbeciles, all of them, their remains now burning into the earth to never be found again. I looked up to the village ahead of me, and felt my eye twitch once more as a thin, transparent shade of red coated my vision. "Yes...perhaps this whole village should be buried beneath the earth."

I leapt high into the air, using wind chakra to propel me through the cloudy night sky like a hawk hunting for prey. I swooped down with relentless speed, for I have found my target; the very center of this damned village. "Earth Style Jutsu!", I bellowed out as I landed on the ground, kneeling and slamming both palms on the rocky surface. A heavy rumbling began to shake the village, and I could hear the cries and screaming of the innocent civilians. I could feel their chakra, and it was just as frantic as that of the fools who have died tonight. The ground below me split into two as a massive crevice opened up, the earth now devouring this village as numerous shacks and homes fell into the abyss. I was levitating above the pit and watching the large plethora of abodes fall into the darkness, and felt as if I were cleansing the world. Yes, cleansing the world of one more problem. That's what a god should do, right? Solve all the worlds problems? Well, I was doing just that. And I was doing it with a smile on my face.

Once the whole village had disappeared, I clasped my hands together, and the halves of the crevice followed suit as it closed up. All that remained of this town was a large crack in the ground, nothing more was lingering. I descended to the surface of the earth and soaked in the ambience of the night, the howling of the wind coupled with the absence of human presence proving to be quite delicious to my senses.

...then I felt my stomach turn. I doubled over and began to vomit, sick with my own actions. It had happened again, the Jyuubi had forced it's will upon me…

The veil of red began to recede from my vision as I stood up straight and wiped the bile from my mouth. I looked at the barren wasteland which I had created, imagining all the children laughing and playing, the women tending to numerous tasks, the men getting together in a bar somewhere as they sang and got intoxicated with glee.

A twinge of guilt struck my heart, and I looked to my palm, which still dripped with the blood of selfish pigs. Is this what it meant to be a god? To be tasked with solving too many issues for one to bear? To be a creator or destroyer for humanity to worship or fear? To be perfect in all aspects?

I let my hand fall, and looked up towards the moon as I let the ominous glowing light of my creation, the Jyuubi body's prison, embrace me. Perhaps I was a god, perhaps I sacrificed my humanity when I sealed the Jyuubi within me. I gave my life, so the rest of the world could keep theirs. Yes...that is what a god should do; sacrifice themselves for the better of man.

And yet, even with complete omnipotence, a god still feels envy. A god does not envy a human's money, or status, or food. No...a god envies humanity itself, and all that comes with it. A human does not have to bear the weight of a god's troubles on their shoulders, and they would be grateful if they knew how heavy such burdens were.

I shook my head to erase my mind of the depressing thoughts, and turned to see the burning hill. The fire had now spread to the house, though it's stone surface remained undamaged. I sighed a little and began to walk towards the home, for it was time that I found my wife and child. We would have to find a new home now, and perhaps this time, we would be fortunate enough to be accepted not as gods, but as people.

For it is the lifestyle of a human that a god envies.


End file.
